Tuesday 8th June 2010

Gestation: 36 weeks, 4 days

One year ago.

 

A woman takes illicit drugs throughout their pregnancy.  Another causes Fetal Alcohol Syndrome in their unborn child because they drink heavily throughout the gestation.  A third beats their baby, breaks its bones.  The Department of Human Services gets involved, they get them back, and then they do it again.

And they keep on breeding.

Repeat cycle;  rinse and spin.

 

* * * * *

If I’m born with a child with liver disease, requiring a liver transplant, I can get that done.  For free.  The cost will run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.  Similarly, if my child needs a heart transplant, and things are complex, the ongoing costs can mean that my child very quickly becomes a million dollar baby.  Again, all for free.  If my child is unfortunate enough to be born with cystic fibrosis, the cost of one of the inhaled medications, Pulmozyme, can cost up to $2000 a month.  As long as I can jump through the right hoops, I can get that subsidised by the Government.  For my forty years of life.  And this is just one of maybe five inhaled medications I will be on.

Yep, you do the maths.

 

* * * * *

But as of January this year, just six months ago, Kevin Rudd and the Labour Government decided to decrease the repayment of IVF from 80% to 35%.  Costs have risen from $900 for the first cycle to $2500.  Many couples require repeat cycles before having success.  Dependent on the procedure, this can increase out of pocket expenses to $7500 per cycle.

Repeat cycle;  rinse and spin.

I see you doing the sums.  The costs can add up very quickly.  But with success, IVF couples are born with healthy kids.  The burden to the health care system evaporates as soon as they get pregnant.  The Government has just bought themselves another tax payer.

Compare that to people with chronic ongoing medical issues.  Diabetes.  Obesity.  Chronic obstructive airway disease.  Cardiac disease.  Would the Government just stop providing hospital beds to these people?  Would they just suddenly make them pay for it?  Would they suddenly triple the health care costs to this minority?

No.  They wouldn’t.  It would be political suicide.  It would be further evidence of an uncaring Government withdrawing support for those in need.

But we haven’t got a chronic illness that will be with us forever.  We need a little help to produce another tax payer.

That’s all.

Suse and I will only need IVF for a year or two, five years at the absolute maximum.

I pay my taxes.  I work hard.  I contribute to the health system.  I’m a doctor for God’s sake.  I am the fucking health system.

In return – for once – I need the health system.

But because my wife has a blocked tube, if we want a family, we have to use IVF.  We have no choice.  So we will pay for the privilege.  Don’t get me wrong.  We’re relieved that we live in a time that we have this choice.  As are all IVF families.  A compliant lot, who will do whatever we can to have kids.  That’s why we’re any easy target.  We’re too busy trying to breed to get politically proactive.  Had we done it last year, the costs would have been a third.  It’s bad luck, but that’s okay.

That’s okay, I can swallow that.

But if we want IVF we need a Police Check?

Where are the Police Checks on the community at large?  Where is there a Police Check on any other person needing health care, any where in the entire system?

Do you need a Police Check to receive health care in jail?  Do you need a Police Check to be allowed to continue a pregnancy if you’re an underage parent?  Do you need a Police Check to get an organ transplant?  Do you need a Police Check to get dialysis?  Do you need a Police Check to treat you for HIV or Hepatitis C?  Do you need a Police Check to get health care if you’re an Aborigine?  Or if you’re a homosexual?

No you fucking don’t.

Because that is what we call DISCRIMINATION.

And discrimination is illegal in this country – last time I looked – although God knows what this Government has been doing while I haven’t been looking.

I get the money bit.  I get it.  I understand why they’re doing it – they’re just trying to balance the books.  And IVF is an easy target.  I think it’s wrong, and I think it’s short sighted, but I get it.

But the Police Check?

Now that’s a fucking bee in my bonnet.

The discrimination has begun.

The infertility discrimination has begun.

* * * * *

Friday 14th May 2010

Gestation: 33 weeks

One year ago.

“And how do you feel, Mark?”

I turn towards the counsellor, and I look at her.  And then I look across at Suse.  She sits in the seat opposite, a comfortable looking seat, but I know from the one I’m in that it’s not.

Or maybe it’s just me.

“It’s been hard, June,” I start, my voice cracking.  I feel irritated by this betrayal by my larynx.   As if she can’t see straight through me anyway.  “It’s been really rough.  And really unfair.”

June looks at me without reacting.  When some people do this, you just want to slap them.  But June has a grace;  an innate kindness that can’t be faked.

“And I find myself getting angry.  Really angry.  Unfairly angry,” I say, surprising myself that I want to continue.  “I see women down the street, perfect strangers, wheeling their kids around in prams, or walking along with them, minding their own business.  And I just want to yell at them.  Or I’ll see a pregnant woman, and I just want to let her have it, for how unfair this whole thing has been.  And these are the ones with kids who are behaving themselves.  Don’t get me started on the ones where the kids are being little shits.”

I stop and look at Suse, who nods slightly in encouragement.

“I just want them to know,” I say, “that it’s unfair.  That it’s just not fair.  And I know, I know, there are a whole bunch of people out there with really bad shit going on.  With really bad diseases and really fucked up existences, and abuse, and homelessness, and full-on, hard-core psychiatric illness.  I know that we’re in a fucking lucky country, and we’re so God-damned lucky that we were given this opportunity, and these brains, and this health, and everything.  But it’s still just unfair!”  I hear my voice rising.  “I see these people getting pregnant, and not even wanting to.  Or even still, I see people getting pregnant who do want to.  In the end, it doesn’t matter.  I have the same reaction with all of them.  I just find myself thinking:  ‘Why can’t this be us?  What did we do so wrong?’ ”

My voice cracks again with this last sentence, and I realise there is a tear at the corner of my eye.

I stop for a moment, and I see that Suse is crying too.

 

* * * * *